Just imagine this cabinet reshuffle farce at a big company

Picture for a moment moving the head of international to the head of legal in a private company, writes Chris Blackhurst. Wouldn’t that be ludicrous?

As the CEO here you can base your selection on various factors, none of which have anything to do with someone’s ability to do the job (PA)

Allow your mind to wander. You’re CEO of a Ftse 100 company. Finally your shareholders have got to you, and you’ve accepted it’s time to shake up the executive committee.

You call in the head of international – everyone’s said he’s useless, and when an overseas operation was in major crisis recently, he chose to remain on his sun lounger, on holiday. You read somewhere that he did law, so you move him across to legal. He has a fit, starts blubbing, so for good measure you chuck in Deputy CEO. It looks good on his business card, even if it’s meaningless – he’s daft enough to be placated by the important-sounding title, so let him believe he’s No 2.

The chap in charge of property development is also rubbish, can’t get anything done, and besides, every time he does attempt anything people start questioning his motives because he got too close to a leading player in the sector at a dinner, the idiot. He’s out. Period.

There’s another one, the schools guy. Hopeless. Also heading for the exit.

As replacement for the international chief, you promote someone who has made a bunch of deals. She says they’re all brilliant (she doesn’t ever stop saying so). You’re not quite sure; in fact, analysts think some of them are not going to do much for the bottom line and are merely extensions of existing agreements, but she’s jolly with it, folks like her, she will be well received abroad, and so she’s elevated.

On the property side, which is all residential, you’re in a quandary. The housing department is one of three massive headaches you’ve got to contend with. The others are the relationship with the Scottish market, which is so bad they’re thinking of splitting away completely; and a scheme to introduce uniformity of resource allocation and investment that you introduced, which you like to call “levelling up”.

There’s one member of the committee whom you begrudgingly like, but he once stabbed you in the back... well, the front, really. However, he’s a good operator, the cleverest one you’ve got, and you’d far rather keep him on the inside, in view, than have him on the outside causing trouble. You lost your chief adviser and look what happened: he’s given you trouble ever since.

Why not give the brainbox not one, not two, but three? That’s right, all of them. That will keep him occupied. Whatever occurs you appear smart: if he succeeds, well done you for appointing him; should he fail, it was his responsibility.

In other, properly run organisations, HR would be involved, and executive search specialists would be prevailed upon. They would be checking CVs and references

The entire education division needs a kicking, so put in a project leader who can lay claim to having overseen just about the only success of your reign, no matter that the programme he is running is far from finished and is about to embark on an awkward second phase.

Your new schools, colleges and universities principal is smooth: ex-business, so he won’t stand for any nonsense from trade unions. He’s a doer, and a strong performer with the press – so the “deputy” can forget it, as the new education head will be doing the fronting on the radio and TV. He’s been handling plenty already and is more than capable.

There’s another post you’re not happy with. You’ve got one person covering digital, culture, media and sports. He’s OK – pleasant, popular, bright. But that’s not good enough, because you would prefer a hard nut, a direct-speaking type.

You’ve got an agenda in that area: there are long-running scores to settle, regarding a major broadcaster you fund and one you wish to sell. Their bosses and outspoken workers must be put back in their respective boxes. You’ve got the right person. No matter that she knows next to nothing about the digital side – a vital, growing element that is of huge concern to a lot of people – you’re sending her in to have a dust-up with the broadcasters. You were hoping that she would be aided and abetted by the veteran ex-newspaper editor bloke you have in mind for industry regulator, but he keeps being turned down as too biased and abrasive. She will still show them.

That’s it: the main moves are done. Some of it is unfair. The legal bod who had to move aside for the demoted international chief, he’d not put a foot wrong. But he was not really on your team, and you and he had disagreed on a fundamental in the past: how best to approach the EU. That was a while ago, but he’d not come round to your way of thinking. A pity, but needs must.

The committee you’ve decided requires a “refresh” has been in existence for little more than two years. The truth is that you should not have appointed its original members in the first place. But you’re the CEO, and you call the shots.

In other, properly run organisations, HR would be involved, and executive search specialists would be prevailed upon. They would be checking CVs and references, making people complete psychometric tests, speaking to former workmates and running interviews to come up with their assessments.

This firm is not like that. As the CEO here you get to choose, and you can base your selection on various factors, none of which have anything to do with someone’s actual ability to do the job.

What’s especially brilliant is that you really can appoint on the flimsiest of pretexts. Funnier still is that your closest supporters lap it up. They will even go in to bat for you, telling anyone who will listen why this appointed person is just so perfect.

Elsewhere, the shareholders, the City, would not stand for any of it. But then this isn’t a successful Ftse 100. It’s the government, and Boris Johnson is the CEO. Who would believe it?